Grow a Sustainable Diet: Planning and Growing to Feed Ourselves and the Earth , Cindy Conner

Book Description

Everyone loves to prepare a meal with ingredients fresh from their own garden. But for most of us, no matter how plentiful our harvest, homegrown produce comprises only a fraction of what we eat. And while many gardening guides will tell you everything you ever wanted to know about individual crops, few tackle the more involved task of helping you maximize the percentage of your diet you grow yourself.

"Grow a Sustainable Diet" will help you develop a comprehensive, customized garden plan to produce the maximum number of calories and nutrients from any available space. Avoid arriving in August buried under a mountain of kale or zucchini (and not much else) by making thoughtful choices at the planning stage, focusing on dietary staples and key nutrients. Learn how to calculate:

• Which food and cover crops are best for your specific requirements
• How many seeds and plants of each variety you should sow
• What and when to plant, harvest, and replant for maximum yield

Focusing on permaculture principles, bio-intensive gardening methods, getting food to the table with minimum fossil fuel input, and growing crops that sustain both you and your soil, this complete guide is a must-read for anyone working towards food self-sufficiency for themselves or their family.

About the Author:
Cindy Conner is a permaculture educator, founder of Homeplace Earth, and the producer of two popular instructional DVDs on sustainable gardening. Her passion is exploring growing a complete diet in a small space while minimizing the use of fossil fuels.

Biographical Note:
Cindy Conner is a permaculture educator and founder of Homeplace Earth. She is the producer of two popular instructional DVDs entitled "Develop a Sustainable Vegetable Garden Plan" and "Cover Crops and Compost Crops IN Your Garden." A former market gardener, Cindy was instrumental in establishing a sustainable agriculture program at her local community college which she taught for over a decade. Her passion is exploring growing a complete diet in a small space and getting food from garden to the table while minimizing the use of fossil fuels.

Review Quotes:
Grow A Sustainable Diet "is just the book you have been looking for!"
---John Jeavons, author of How To Grow More Vegetables--and Fruits, Nuts Berries, Grains and Other Crops Than You Ever Thought Possible On Less Land Than You Can Imagine 

"Amid the plethora of how-to garden books, this book stands out as the comprehensive resource written from the lifetime of rich experience of a successful gardener.
Cindy not only gives us experienced guidelines for the management of a healthy organic garden, but clearly explains the practical details of every aspect of managing a successful garden-homestead from planning, tending, harvest and storage to preserving the harvest. If you are seeking one book to to carry you through the full cycle of gardening, seek no further! "
---Eli Rogosa . Heritage Grain Conservancy, growseed.org 

Grow a Sustainable Diet" is both timely and timeless. Cindy Connor's book is a valuable addition to current locavore lexicon. The practical down home advice she provides will be of use for generations of gardeners to come. Cindy speaks with authority, drawing on her real life experience, her teaching skills and her love of the earth, providing practical guidance to help readers to design the garden and to grow, store and use the fruits of their labor. A combination of bio-intensive gardening, permaculture planning, and straight forward down home wisdom Grow a Sustainable Diet shows us that good nutrition is a close as our own back yard."
---Darrell E. Frey, Three Sisters Farm, author of The Bioshelter Market Garden 

"Are you looking for ways to better nourish your family, care for your garden, and walk more lightly on the planet? Come spend a day, a season or the cycle of seasons with one of the nation's leaders in ecological home food production in the pages of" Grow a Sustainable Diet. " Ms. Conner's practical innovations will guide your homesteading endeavors, and her commitment to living in harmony with all life.

Jacket Description/Back:
MAXIMIZE YOUR HARVEST AND FEED YOUR SOIL
BY DEVELOPING A CUSTOMIZED PLAN FOR YOUR GARDEN 
Just the book you have been looking for!---John Jeavons, author of How To Grow More Vegetables--and Fruits, Nuts Berries, Grains and Other Crops Than You Ever Thought Possible On Less Land Than You Can Imagine 

A combination of bio-intensive gardening, permaculture planning, and straight forward down home wisdom Grow a Sustainable Diet shows us that good nutrition is a close as our own back yard.
---Darrell E. Frey, Three Sisters Farm, author of The Bioshelter Market Garden 

It's not just how you grow - what you grow and where you grow it are at the root of truly sustainable food production. Grow a Sustainable Diet will help you develop a comprehensive, customized garden plan to produce the maximum number of calories, dietary staples and key nutrients from any available space. Learn how to calculate: 

• Which food and cover crops are best for your specific requirements
• How many seeds and plants of each variety you should sow
• What and when to plant, harvest and replant for maximum yield. 

While many gardening guides will tell you everything you ever wanted to know about individual crops, few tackle the more involved task of helping you maximize the percentage of your diet you grow yourself. Focusing on permaculture principles, biointensive gardening methods, minimum fossil fuel input, and growing crops that sustain both you and your soil, Grow a Sustainable Diet is a must-read for anyone working toward food self-sufficiency for themselves or their family. 

Imagine gardening as a process which improves the soil even as we grow our crops, helps balance and enrich the ecology, relies on free services of nature rather than purchased inputs--and is powered with energy from the nearest star. That is the way of gardening Cindy Conner offers in Growing a Sustainable Diet.
---Harvey Ussery, author of The Small-Scale Poultry Flock 

Cindy Conner is a permaculture educator, founder of Homeplace Earth and the producer of two popular instructional DVDs on sustainable gardening. Her passion lies in helping everyone to work towards growing a complete diet in a small space while minimizing the input of fossil fuels. 

To help bring you the very best inspiration and information about greener, more sustainable lifestyles, Mother Earth News is recommending select New Society Publishers books to its readers. This book is one of them.


Table of Contents:

• Foreword / John Jeavons -- First, a little history
• 1. Sustainable Diet -- What If the Trucks Stop Coming? -- Making Changes
• 2. Garden Maps -- Plan Outside the Box -- Permaculture Plan -- Tools for Map Making
• 3. Crop Choices -- Growing Calories -- Growing Protein -- Growing Calcium -- Oils and Sweeteners -- Other Crops -- More Planning Tools -- Worksheet: Temperatures -- Worksheet: Precipitation
• 4. How Much to Grow -- Worksheet: How Much to Grow -- Biosphere 2 -- Homegrown Fridays -- Oils and Sweeteners -- Keeping Records
• 5. Cover Crops and Compost-Planning for Sustainability -- Beware of Bringing in Outside Inputs -- Grow Your Own Compost -- Sixty Percent Compost Crops -- Worksheet: 60/40 Bed Crop Months -- Cutting Rye at Pollen Shed -- Harvesting the Grain
• 6. Companion Planting -- Potatoes -- Achieving Balance -- Borders
• 7. Plan for Food When You Want It -- Frost Dates -- Worksheet: Plant/Harvest Times -- Plant/Harvest Times -- Length of Harvest -- Determinate and Indeterminate -- Plant and Harvest Schedule -- Worksheet: Plant/Harvest Schdeule -- Plan for Special Events
• 8. Rotations and Sample Garden Maps -- Transition Garden -- Quartet of Beds -- Garden of Ideas
• 9. Seeds -- Seed Inventory -- Worksheet: Seed Inventory -- How Many Seeds? -- Worksheet: Seeds and Plants Needed -- Germination Test -- Save Your Own
• 10. Including Animals -- Chickens -- Dairy-Goats and Cows -- Swine -- Rabbits
• 11. Food Storage and Preservation -- Make Use of the Space You Already Have -- Crawl Space Root Cellar -- Pantry -- Cooling Cabinet -- Fermentation -- Canning -- Solar Food Dryers -- Grain Mills
• 12. Sheds, Fences, and Other Stuff -- Garden Shed -- Water Storage -- Outdoor Washing Station -- Coldframe -- Chicken House -- Trellises -- Fencing
• 13. Rethink Everything!
• Endnotes -- Resources -- Index -- About the Author.